The state of employee engagement is much in the news lately. The first quarter of 2010 largely saw engagement levels remainingsteady, but this began to change by the end of the quarter and into April in both the US and the UK. Particularly concerning to advocates of the power of employee engagement are findings that only 25% of senior leaders and 17% of frontline leaders are themselves highly engaged. And then there’s the seeming backlash against engagement from HR practitioners and business leaders who do not see the promised benefit of various “engagement initiatives” in their organizations or are confused by the seeming multitude of different definitions of engagement and systems to measure it. To me, this all serves to complicate what is actually a simple issue. Achieving success in employee engagement initiatives depends primarily on the motivation for pursuing engagement efforts. Is employee engagement something you are trying to do to employees – yet another “initiative” being foisted upon them? Or is employee engagement something you are hoping to foster in the organization? It’s the latter that has a far greater chance of short- and long-term success. Don’t Force It – Enable It You cannot create, encourage or incent employee engagement. You can only create a work environment in which employees may choose to engage. Think about it. In my career I’ve worked in positions where I simply did not see the point of what I was doing or what the company was trying to achieve. I never received acknowledgment of the work I did. In those positions, why should I care? Why should I give my all and more? Why should I “engage?” Then again, I’ve also worked in positions and companies in which I not only understood where the company was going and what they were trying to accomplish in the world, but I also fully understood how I could help get us there and how my efforts mattered and were appreciated in accomplishing that. In these situations, I didn’t have to “be engaged” by some initiative, I chose to engage myself and yes, give discretionary effort (often the measure of success in employee engagement), because I personally understood and believed in what was going on. Those are two very different scenarios. Companies considering employee engagement need to step back and take a deep, hard look first at what they are communicating to employees, how they are aligning company strategic objectives with personal tasks, and how they are making company goals real in the daily work of every employee. That’s the magic dust, but there’s no magic in it. Just good, solid business practice. We believe the most positive way to effect this is through strategic employee recognition that specifically and deliberately recognizes employees when they demonstrate a company value in contribution to achieving a strategic objective. When you do this consistently and frequently, and you allow and encourage every employee to participate, then you help employees make the connection between their work and the company purposes, lending meaning and value to what they do. This in turn gives them the intrinsic motivation to engage.